Invocation of the Muse

“Each of the arts whose office is to refine, purify, adorn, embellish and grace life is under the patronage of a muse, no god being found worthy to preside over them.”

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

The act of creativity - whether writing (music, lyric or poem), painting, singing, dancing - is not altogether different from the art of Love. When you're there, present and in a serendipitous continuity with the essence of it, breezes murmur secrets. The air sparkles with invisible light. You feel invincible, confident and radiant with inward song of fire. You flow.

When you are not, things are arid. Colorless. The pen is dry. Even answering emails seems impossible.

It's mysterious how that gamut ranges, and easy to see how the ancients considered inspiration not just a simple fancy (or flight) of the moment, but a powerful and mythological entity unto itself worthy of seduction, worhship and yes, even sacrifice.

Poetic tradition holds that the muse was formally invoked at the onset of many epic poems. A few examples:

Homer, in Book I of The Odyssey:

"Sing to me of the man, Muse, the man of twists and turns driven time and again off course, once he had plundered the hallowed heights of Troy." (Robert Fagles translation, 1996)

Catullus, in Carmen I:

"And so, have them for yourself, whatever kind of book it is, and whatever sort, oh patron Muse let it last for more than one generation, eternally." (Student translation, 2007)

Pythagoras, upon his arrival in Croton, advised officials to build a shrine to the Muses to inspire harmony and learning. The word 'museum' means literally 'shrine of the muses'. Muse worship was heavily identified with the hero-cults of the poets where poetic recitals were accompanied by literal sacrifices to the muse.